How They Got Here: The San Francisco Giants is a
one-by-one look at how each member of the 2012 World Series Champion San
Francisco Giants found their way to the squad. We'll look at all of the
players on the roster, as well as notable players who did not make the
postseason roster for whatever reason and the coaching staff and general
manager. Part fifteen tells us of the young shortstop Brandon Crawford.
Brandon Crawford was born on January 21, 1987, in Mountain View, California. He attended Foothill High School in Pleasanton, California, before continuing his studies at UCLA. He majored in physiological sciences, and played baseball for the UCLA Bruins from 2006 to 2008. He was named team Most Valuable Player in both 2006 and 2007, and was named to the Pac-10 Conference Team in the 2007 season as well. Crawford was drafted in the 2008 draft to the San Francisco Giants as a fourth round selection. To close out his 2008 season, he played in the Giants farm system, first with the Rookie level Arizona League Giants and then later with the Salem-Keizer Volcanoes of Salem, Oregon in the Class A Short Season Northwest League. He hit to a .375 batting average in five games. He took on an expanded role in 2009, and progressed rapidly up to the Class A Advanced San Jose Giants of the California League. Here, he had a line of a .371 batting average, six home runs, and seventeen runs batted in over twenty-five games, before stepping up to the Class AA Connecticut Defenders of Norwich, Connecticut in the Eastern League, where he played in 108 games while hitting to a .258 batting average, four home runs, and thirty-one runs batted in. Crawford struggled in 2010, beginning with San Jose again for a short time, before switching to the Giants' new Class AA affiliate, the Richmond Flying Squirrels of Richmond, Virginia, also in the Eastern League. For the season, he hit .236, with seven home runs and twenty-three runs batted in. Crawford looked to be in line for the starting job at shortstop for the big league Giants squad, but a broken finger at the end of spring training derailed this path. He appeared in rehabilitation games with San Jose, hitting to a .322 batting average with three home runs and fifteen runs batted in over fourteen games, before receiving his first major league call up on May 26th. He started playing on the next day, and became the sixth major league player to hit a grand slam in his first game. He was sent down to the Class AAA Fresno Grizzlies of the Pacific Coast League on July 31st to make room for the newly acquired Orlando Cabrera, and played all of August there. He hit only .234 during that time, while producing one home run and nine runs batted in. He returned to the Giants among the September call ups, and closed out a season that saw him hit .204 with three home runs and twenty-one runs batted in. Nevertheless, Crawford earned the Giants' trust with the shortstop job, and played all of the 2012 season as the starter. His hitting skills aren't all that pronounced yet in the early parts of his career, but his sterling defense makes him a very attractive option for the difficult fielding position. For 2012, he hit to a .248 batting average, as well as four home runs and forty-five runs batted in, and he earned a spot on the postseason roster. Here, he had a few key hits, including four of his seven postseason runs batted in during elimination games. Most memorably was his triple in Game 5 against the Cincinnati Reds in the National League Division Series, which began the scoring. While he didn't act completely as a hero in any given game, his defense was reliable and even clutch at times, and likely saved a run or two that may have cost him and his teammates the 2012 World Series Championship.
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